Rochester Catholic parish helps provide Mexicans with ID cards

Published: 2004-10-28

ROCHESTER, N.Y. (CNS) -- Hundreds of Mexican migrants living throughout the Rochester Diocese came to the Church of the Epiphany one day this fall to obtain Mexican consular identification cards. The Mexicans obtained the cards with the assistance of several consulate representatives who traveled to the church from their office in New York City. The cards identify the bearers as Mexican citizens who are residing in the United States and will allow them to more easily travel from the United States to Mexico, according to Norberto Terrazas, consul for legal protection of Mexican citizens. Sandra Rojas, coordinator of the Diocese of Rochester's Hispanic Migrant Ministry in Monroe County, said many of the Mexicans have no form of official identification, which can create legal difficulties both in the United States and Mexico. "They are invisible in this country," Rojas said of the Mexicans, many of whom are employed as farmworkers. "They need identification to prove who they are to open a bank account, to cash a check, (or) when the police stop them," she told the Catholic Courier, Rochester's diocesan newspaper.

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